


If You Could See

by SecretlyIrish



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Gilbert has a crush on Lovino who doesn't like him back, M/M, Onesided, eventual angst, that might change though
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-03
Updated: 2016-06-07
Packaged: 2018-07-11 23:12:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 1,788
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7074679
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SecretlyIrish/pseuds/SecretlyIrish
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gilbert fell for the one person he couldn't have, yet also the one person he truly needed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Gilbert watched Lovino ramble on about his day, smiling as he watched the emotions flit across the cutie's face with absolute fascination. Lovino had a scowl on, of course, but that didn't mean his eyes didn't show all the adorable feelings Lovino loved to pretend he didn't have. He swooned a little when Lovino held up a painting he'd done earlier that day, which was an abstracted piece that was obviously inspired by street art. Something about it made him want to kiss the short and angry little guy.

"Hey, Gil, you okay? You're more freakishly spacey than usual," Lovino grumbled, face drawn into subtle worry. Gilbert just laughed it off and gave him a subtle wink.

"Awe, you worry about me~ How cute," he cooed, blowing Lovino a kiss. He was just fucking around, as far as Lovino was concerned, so the Italian didn't really pay any attention to it. 

How was he supposed to know that every time Lovino didn't notice a piece of Gilbert's heart shattered?

Lovino simply rolled his eyes and went back to rambling about all the (really cool) shit Lovino had done that day while Gilbert happily listened. Under most circumstances he would have given exactly zero fucks about what anyone was doing at any given point in time, but with Lovino it was a whole different story. Gilbert was completely fascinated with Lovino, yet he knew Lovino wasn't interested. It didn't matter what Antonio or Francis said, it was pointless... Even if they /did/ have a point when they said that telling him wouldn't hurt anything.

"Yo, fuckface, you're spacing again. You sure everything is alright?" Lovino asked, pausing his rambles to worry over his unlikely best friend. Gilbert blinked back into reality and gave him the most heart warming look he had. Which of course just made Lovino a little bit more worried. 

"I'm fine, Vino. I guess I'm still recovering from that breakup with Liza," Gilbert lied, smiling a little. He and Elizabeta had broken up a couple weeks ago, about a month after Gilbert had admitted that a) he had fallen out of love with her and b) he was head over heels for Lovino and had been for an extremely long amount of time. 

Lovino stopped scowling and instead hugged him, which felt really, really nice. "Hey man, I'm fine alright? I just have to get used to being single again. I don't love her like that anymore, so no biggie. The awesome me can handle it!" Lovino just playfully smacked Gilbert and rolled his eyes. 

"Sure thing Mr. Fine, just... If you ever need someone you got me, okay?" Gilbert nodded, and Lovino relaxed. Their unlikely friendship resumed its normal comforting banter and idle chatter, as if nothing had even happened. That was one of Gilbert's favourite things about Lovino, he never seemed to let sad things interrupt him for long and would bounce back to being grumpy, adorable, sweet, brilliant Lovino in no time at all.


	2. Chapter 2

Gilbert stood on softly creaking silver as the black pressed down on him. When the pressure was enough for him to bow his head he saw his deepest desires cruelly reflected in the cold, unfeeling colour, taunting him. "Shut up," he hissed with words like ice shattering in water, "Stop showing me these things."

But when the black eased up just a little, just enough for him to lift his eyes, he would see the golden figure of Lovino taunting him with his unreachable perfection. There was no escape for him, not even within his own mind, trapped beneath the never ending ebony and the glass silver on the verge of shattering and stabbing into him, tearing apart.

His chest felt tight, like some kind of chain had wrapped itself around his lungs and kept wrapping and wrapping and wrapping and-

There was a great creak, like a coffin being opened after laying in a crypt for many hundreds of years, and then the crash of glass on stone flooring. He'd lost his grip, anxiety was taking over. He tried to scream for help, but there was no air in his lungs, he tried to claw his way out of the black, but his hands could find no purchase and then everything began to glow.

"Gilbert," a coffee flavoured voice whispered, bitter and sweet at the same time, "Take a deep breath...."

The glow held him until the silver slowly pieced itself back together and he could open his eyes to find himself staring into eyes the colour of the Earth- green on top and brown on bottom, mixing in the middle to give the impression of bushes against tree trunks and grass against dirt. These were Lovino's eyes, a perfect contrast to Gilbert's own mix of blood and tears, as that's all Gilbert's eyes looked to himself.

Lovino would agree that Gilbert's eyes were tears and blood, but perhaps not in the same regard that Gilbert held for them. The blood was that of a soldier in battle, shed in the endless war Gilbert fought against all the many demons, and the tears that of an angel who's wings had been ripped off by a cruel and uncaring God. It was beautiful, it was broken. And Lovino often worried about it.

Gilbert still shook from the intensity of his anxiety attack, but managed a grin nonetheless, "Hey, I'm fine okay? Nothing can break the awesome me down for long," Gilbert whispered,voice still carrying the jagged edges of broken glass, now slightly dulled. 

"I know that, but fuck you I'll worry about you if I want to," Lovino responded, the bitterness slowly beginning to overtake the sweet, but there would always be that delicious undertone of the gentler flavour to remind Gil Lovino really did care. Even if platonically.


	3. Chapter 3

 The next day was Monday, so it was no wonder that Gilbert felt so completely blank, as if the silver and the black had just meshed to become one singular monotone hue.

He didn't mind it,he even preferred this vast nothingness to the endless struggle for air beneath any other colour. He got ready without a sound, everything in perfect disorder on his person, and left without having grabbed breakfast or lunch.

His day was just the same as it always was. A smile for his friends that didn't reach his heart, a rose in Lovi's locker when no one was looking, a tear in those quiet moments where no one was looking, and then when he got home he sighed, shattering the silence of his own emotions. And then he drew, the skritch skritch of pencil against pencil like music, sad, flowing music. Like love. Like loss. Like hurt. Like loneliness. Like green. Like black. Like yellow. Like monochrome.

And when he stopped drawing he realized he was staring at Lovino's face again, recreated in perfect detail, not a single hair missing, not even the small zit on his left cheekbone or the tiny, almost invisible, scar on his right from the time he went head first into a rose bush trying to learn how to use his skateboard. And then Gilbert sobbed.

He lay crumpled up on his bed, sobbing, for an indefinite amount of time before his phone went off and the mask back on. He would have ignored it if the Tarantella Napoletani hadn't bounced across the room in its quick dance of gold and lemon yellow joy, like the warmth of a fire on a cold winter night or the feeling of being held by someone you care for.

The mask went on, and he answered in a voice like the ripples on water during a Summer rain, "Hello?" 

"Hey, Gil, got a moment?" Lovino's voice was shaking, something was wrong. Red hit panic slid down Gilbert's being and filled his lungs and started his heart running.

"Yes, what happened? Fuck are you okay?" the gentle summer rain in Gilbert's voice had become the desperate crashes of waves on a stormy sea against one small ship of sanity.

 "Yeah, I just... God I just have to get out. Can I... Can I come over a minute? It's my Grandpa again, and fuck," Lovino sounded rough, like he was crying.

"You don't have to ask. You know I live alone, and that I'm always willing to have you over. Especially if he's at it again."

I knew every time I saw him I would feel so blissful and happy, and I knew every time he came he would eventually have to go, and that every time he left I would crash all the harder, yet I didn't care. I was going to be there for him, no matter how much it hurt me.


	4. Chapter 4

Now that Lovino was comfortably seated next to Gilbert on his bed, there was a calm silence wrapped around them like a warm blanket. Neither dared disturb it at first, both far too comfortable in it, but there were words burning through Gilbert's tongue, thick like molasses, but hot like molten lava.

"So, those roses you've been getting for months now, any closer to figuring who they're from?" Gilbert started, and he would have gone pale if he wasn't already white as a sheet, that's how nervous he was.

"No. You don't know who, by any chance, do you?" Lovino responded, slowly, like a lion stretching out lazily in the sun. Powerful, but content for now. 

"I do. It was uh... Well it was me," Gilbert admitted. Then there was another silence, but not a calm one. It was taught and ready to violently snap.

Gilbert found himself pressed against the black and the silver once again, the faces of a laughing audience pointing to him, pressed firmly against the glass and held by thick, burning chains. He couldn't breathe, couldn't think, couldn't speak, just stare. And then-

"That's adorable," Lovino whispered, a small smile on his face.

The tense silence crashed down, roaring as it fell beside Gilbert's ears like an entire world sighing in relief all at once. He could handle it being childishly adorable, just as long as he didn't lose his best friend.

And that was that. And then they curled up, and went to sleep. Lovino hadn't straight up rejected Gilbert, so Gilbert was content. Sure they weren't together, but they weren't any further apart.

And that's all that mattered.

The pang in his chest didn't matter, nor did the flecks of Ultramarine and Windsor blue that began to cling to his soul. They didn't matter.

Nothing did, except that Lovino seemed happy. Except that they weren't drifting. Except that they were okay.

A/N: this seems a tad short. I hope you enjoyed it anyway.


End file.
